I’ve decided on the sleep schedule I’d like to adapt to. I’ve heard of the Dymaxion sleep schedule, the Everyman sleep schedule, and the Uberman sleep schedule. However, the sleep schedule I want is triphasic which none of those are.

I didn’t want to feel left out, so I had to think of a cool name too, and nothing is cooler than Batman! So meet “The Batman Sleep Schedule”.

30 minute naps every 8 hours.

If you do the math, that’s 3 naps for a total of 90 minutes every day. I was doing some research and “they say” that we usually get 90 minutes of REM during monophasic sleep. So that’s how much REM I’ll be aiming for as well.

Now, one of my goals is to foster a community of polyphasic sleepers, so you can say using The Batman Sleep Schedule for the name of my particular pattern was a marketing decision because it’s easy to remember, and you kind of already know what it might mean. After all, how the hell can Batman run a business during the day and fight crime at night? He has to be polyphasic. Also, Batman wasn’t born with any superpowers. He developed his skills through the training of his body and mind which polyphasic sleepers need to do during adaptation.

While I’m in the mood to name things, I’m gonna start referring to monophasic sleep as “The Slave Sleep Schedule”. And I’ll tell you why.

They say (who are “They”, and why do they keep “saying” what I need?) that we need 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep to have a good nights rest. So let’s break down a typical slave’s schedule.

John Doe’s alarm beeps at him at 7:00am. He has an hour to exercise and shower. He eats some Cocoa Pebbles for breakfast and he’s off to brave the morning traffic. He starts working and does a half ass job because he knows if he works harder, he’ll get paid the same amount. John can’t wait till 5:00pm comes around. After browsing through Amazon for a new Bluray movie to buy , his time finally comes when his master allows him to leave. Here comes traffic all over again. He arrives home just in time for dinner with the wife and little ones. Quesadillas! John’s favorite. After dinner, they have family time watching Monsters Inc. 9:00pm, time to put the kids to sleep. Now for some QT with Jane. Congratulations John, you were able to put the wife to sleep with a smile on her face. Finally, some alone time. After a long day, John just wants to veg out and watch Family Guy then it’s off to bed. John does this every weekday. Weekends are reserved for social gatherings and errands.

There’s something that wasn’t reserved a block of time. Time to be able to do something amazing is absent from that schedule.

There exists in each of us something only we, through our unique experiences, are able to do. It can be anything. Some of you already know what it is. However, it takes time to develop this unique ability and develop it into something amazing. A superpower if you will.

Someone might have the power to create a beautiful song that has never been heard before. Another might have the power to create a website that can change the world. The possibilities are limitless. Anyone can be a hero using their talents.

Sometimes I think The Slave Sleep Schedule was put into place as a form of control. If you notice, there’s hardly any time to yourself. And when you do have time to yourself, you want to use it to relax and consume something like a movie, but not to produce something amazing. No time to think for yourself. No time to realize that you don’t need to depend on a company or government to live life. You can get anything a company or government offers and more by using your own natural talents if they had time to develop into superpowers. Conspiracy theories aside, somehow we’ve come to a day and age where it is acceptable to not use a talent. We set it aside and don’t make time for it. People think there’s no time for it, or it’s too risky to pursue.

Well my friends, I think there is a way to make time to develop a superpower, and it’s through polyphasic sleep. Here is my implementation of The Batman Sleep Schedule which is designed to be backwards compatible with The Slave Sleep Schedule which means you won’t have to risk your job, and you’ll still be able to do the same things and more.

As you can see, one can still work a 9 to 5 until their superpower is developed enough that it can provide everything the job can. More meals and another shower were added since awake time is extended. Between 11pm – 7am (about 8 hours), you can develop a superpower that can save the world!

On the next post, I’ll show my plan to transition gradually from the Slave Sleep Schedule to the Batman Sleep Schedule without feeling like a zombie for a few weeks.

32 Responses to The Batman Sleep Schedule

Er, well, I wouldn’t go naming a schedule until AFTER you know it works, yo. There are a zillion polyphasic-type schedules out there that people thought sounded cool, but only three (so far) that actually cut the mustard. (I didn’t name Uberman or Everyman until I’d successfully adapted to them, for what it’s worth.)

Also, for marketing, “Batman” is a horrible name, since it’s trademarked to the moon and back, and you’ll never be allowed to use it! …Just a thought, heh.

On the subject of triphasic schedules, I’ve seen them tried a few times unsuccessfully (there may still be posts in the Google Groups “polyphasic” archives about those attempts). That’s not to say it isn’t worth a go.

However, your theory has some bumps that you might want to look into before getting serious: First, that naps are “all REM” on polyphasic sleep is a myth, or we’re pretty sure it is. The best science we’ve got says that polyphasic naps probably include the same phases as regular sleep, only compressed. (This would explain why a) polyphasers don’t go crazy from never getting three of the four usual types of sleep, and also b) why a good polyphasic nap can feel like it took hours, to the sleeper.)

Secondly, in most sleepers’ experiences, a 30-minute nap is actually less restful than a 20-minute nap. I’m unable to explain why, but many, many testimonies bear it out. So, making the naps 10 minutes longer may actually be hurting, rather than helping, your efficiency and the amount of rest you get.

AFAIK, there’s no reason to believe that replacing 6 20-minute naps with 3 30-minute ones would work. It certainly doesn’t fit the “formula” for schedules that work, as far as we’re aware of it. (The known formula is on the Google Group somewhere; it’s also in the Ubersleep book.) Then again, it never hurts to try, as long as you’re responsible about it and keep very, very good notes so the rest of us can follow along too!

In regards to the name, I like to name things before they amount to anything. Gives them some personality. Like naming a company, a baby, or invention before it’s created.

As for trademarks, I’ll have more posts on views about copyright and the like. Basically, I believe we need to rethink if an idea can be owned. Inspired by Rosa Parks, I will not let any law get in the way of my beliefs, so you’ll see me breaking copyright law and releasing anything I create to the public domain.

I will not be using my polyphasic sleep experience for any monetary gain, and if DC Comics wants to go after me, I am ready to face off with them accordingly.

As I’ve mentioned to you, I did try polyphasic sleep before, but had to stop because of social reasons. So my reason for only three naps is so I’ll have more uninterrupted blocks of time, so worrying about my next nap won’t interfere with whatever I’m doing. Logging will also be easier.

I did remember feeling like I had hours of rest after doing 20 minute nap. If the 30 minute naps don’t seem to be working, I’ll try reducing them to 20 so I’ll only get 1 hour of sleep a day. I have extreme faith in my body’s ability to adapt.

It’s a very very long story to why i am now sitting here at 7am in the morning typing this message to you, and it’s such a long story, that i hope one day in the future i can get to tell you it. Anyway my sleep pattern for what i can remember over my life has been crazy to say the least. And in the last 2 years even more so. But recently i have been trying to understand what sleep is all about and how much we need of it. But for the first time today i have read something from your blog that finally makes sense to me. Firstly i think the name for your sleep pattern (Batman) is super. It fits perfect, or maybe we can call it “”Super Batman power naps”” but i am not to sure on the cycle that you mention. I have not at all experimented with Polyphasic sleep, but from my inner feeling and deep knowledge i know it is the right way, and i am 100% certain that it can save the world and human kind. As for the cycle i have a feeling that 25 minutes 5 times a day is more than likely the right pattern to research. Why you may ask? well another long story but The Law of Fives is summarized in the Principia Discordia:

1:The Law of Fives states simply that: All things happen in fives, or are divisible by or are multiples of five, or are somehow directly or indirectly appropriate to 5

2:The Law of Fives is never wrong.

So what do you think, as i would love to hear from you about all this as i think we are connected.

By the way, my boyfriend has just came downstairs asking me again why i am not asleep, i just explained to him what i had found out. He now tells me that our relationship is over, because he cannot handle my constant change anymore. I then just realized that i am the weather, and i told him so. Everyday he wakes up not really knowing what the weather is going to be like, but yet he accepts it and makes the most of it, but when he doesnt want to be part of the weather anymore he finds shelter from it. And so he has said he has a house to keep the weather out, and now that i call my self the weather. that i must leave. OH GOD!!! how crazy is that.. hahaha
GOD GOD GOD…

Anyway lastly thank you for the great information and i really hope to hear from you soon.

Interesting concept, thanks for the link to my blog, FWIW, I wouldn’t necessarily say that I’m a long term polyphaser, but I have had about 2.5 years of polyphasic sleep that was on and off, it had a tendency to get shuffled around here and there and was never stable for too long before something came up.

As for your schedule, good luck if you choose to give it a whirl, I would like to echo Puredoxyk’s thoughts on it as well, we’ve shared ideas over the past couple years, and from everything I have experienced, she seems to have it down fairly well. I think the balance between enough sleep time/quality and length of naps is critical, and when you cut both down too far you may end up just plain sleep deprived, but without enough time for your body to make up for it in naps, that said, yours may be capable of more than mine!
In terms of length, I never allow myself a nap of longer than 25 minutes. Once I get past there, the body tends to start pumping the zombie juice as well as shutting down the rest of the body for a longer sleep, so when I wake up, I feel groggy, slow, and often cold. New nappers may use up to 30 minutes because part of that is the falling to sleep phase. I find that I typically will get a max of 15-20 minutes of *sleep* (excluding falling asleep) in a nap before my body is ready to wake up and go, if I sleep past that, I’m in sore shape.

I wrote a paper about polyphasic sleep recently. I found a study that the ideal nap length is 10-20 minutes. NAPS LONGER THAN 20 MINUTES leave you groggy for 30-45 minutes before providing benefits that aren’t superior to a 10 minute nap.

As Aximilation said, your body will already want to wake up after 15-20 minutes. Even in adaptation you’ll wake up before a 20 minute alarm.

I’ve experimented with the Batman pattern, and found that it didn’t work for me. I’m not sure whether it’s the triphasic nature or the 30 minute naps, but I don’t think that this is a workable pattern.

Inspired by Batman, though, I have adapted to what I call the Tesla pattern – 20 minutes every six hours. It works out to even less total sleep than Batman, but is a) quadraphasic, and b) uses 20 minute naps, two attributes which have been shown to work through Dymaxion and Uberman, respectively. It now has two successful adherents (that I know of).

If you’re interested in low-sleep patterns, maybe give this one a go – would be interested to know how you find it. There’s some more info about it, including an adaption blog, on my website.

@Sharif & Jorel
Having done some heavy research for a school paper (justifying my polyphasic lifestyle), I discovered probably reasons for WHY the Uberman schedule works and most others fail.
1) 20-minute naps. The body naturally wants to take 20-minute naps. Also, a study released only last December (2008) revealed that napping for between 10 and 20 minutes provides the optimal cognitive boost, while napping for 30 minutes actually makes you groggy. Any sleep schedule dependent on 30-minute naps is un-sustainable.
2) Naps every 4 hours. For some reason, that 4-hour time slot fits with natural body cycles. I don’t know why. Sleepiness naturally comes ever 4 hours. :-)
3) 2 hours total sleep. It turns out that when your body gets tired, it can “compress” some phases of your sleep, which actually makes you feel more rested (ironically). However, there are certain phases that can’t be compressed (like REM), totaling at least 90 minutes. In other words, if someone tries to sleep less than 90 minutes, they’re hosed.

Having done both the Uberman and the Everyman, I can tell you that they both work. Uberman is easier, actually, but requires a strict schedule. Everyman requires more sleep (a 1-2 hour core), but is more flexible.

I tried dymaxion for 4 days and I failed because today, the 4th day fell horrible. I had to do a lot of things and I just couldnt deal with it. So I’m considering switching to everyman specially now that school starts next week–I wouldnt want to sabotage myself by doing something this drastic while having a lot of new stuff to learn.

My only problem has been that I feel very stressed when I go down for a nap; I feel like time passes by and I don’t fall asleep, which is why I thought half an hour has to be better than 20 minutes since it’s ALL the sleep you get. Is there an easy way to fall asleep right away to make sure you get the rest you need?

Thanks jorel314! Yeah I read about Pavlov’s dogs for my psych class last semester and it makes a whole lot of sense. I did find a track that soothes me a lot. It’s Return to Innocence by Enigma. :) Are there any other you would recommend?

According to an old issue of Legends of the Dark Knight, Batman sleeps a total of two hours, not 90 minutes. You should get more than just the REM basics so you get at least a little of the other phases.

Hi, i’m a monophasic sleeper. I sleep 10 hours a day. If it’s holiday i sleep for 12 hours. When i go to bed i usually stare at the ceiling for 30-60 mins and fall asleep. I hate sleeping. It sounds strange when you say that like that but sleeping kills my free time.

I will try Batman or Tesla in summer and start a blog about it. Jorel314, If you started Batman or have info about it please let me know. Also anybody who tried polyphasic can tell me about effects of alcohol? I done some research but didn’t find much info about it. I dont drink coffee but i may have problems with alcohol when i start Batman or Tesla. 20-30 mins of sleeping doesn’t seem so refreshing when it comes to alcohol

@Alter Ego: Try Uberman first. Weird as it may sound, it’s the easiest to adjust to, and it only takes about 5 days before you start feeling a lot better. Everyman is also good, but it takes longer to adapt. As far as I know, “Batman” is still unproven.

@Jorel: Did you ever put Batman to the test? I’m bumbling around your blog (not easy, since I’m in China and you’re blocked), but I don’t see posts about how Batman treated you. I keep having people contact me on my blog about trying Batman, and I’ve had to tell them I’ve still not seen anyone succeed. Can you let us know either way, if it worked or if it didn’t? Gracias!

Thanks for the answer. I have 18 days to adjust into polyphasic system. I’ll start at January. Because of school i have to stay awake from 12:10 to 5:15. I have to stay awake for 5 hours so i can’t keep up with Uberman. I might start with Uberman and adjust into Tesla. I really need the free time.

About Batman, napping for 30 minutes seems… difficult to me. But you can’t know without trying. I’d like to read your blog about Batman in future, Jorel.

Thanks for commenting. I’ve been on a short hiatus. I started adapting to Batman in September then I went to Burning Man and my schedule got all out of whack… Back now and I plan on readapting in January.

A quick question: Which system is easier to adapt? Everyman seems easy. But i don’t get the point of core sleeps. Uberman seems easy too and there are lots of other systems. Which one is the easiest to adapt?

@Alter Ego: Everyman, by far. I’ve tried all of the major schedules (Uberman, Everyman, Tesla and Dymaxion), and tried and failed to adapt to Batman, and Everyman was ridiculously easy compared to Uberman, and even more so compared to Dymaxion and Tesla.

@Aler Ego: Depends on what you mean by “easy.” Everyman is hard to adjust to if you need to keep a schedule and if you want to consider yourself “adapted” to polyphasic sleep. Uberman is painful for 4-5 days, after which you’ve adapted and it’s pretty simple. Everyman takes a lot longer to adapt to, but the transition isn’t as hard. Uberman is nice because it’s harder to oversleep 20-minute naps, but it’s easy to oversleep a 2-hour core.

My personal preference: As many naps as Uberman, but take one of them as an hour to an hour and a half instead of just 20 mins. 3 hours of sleep instead of 2 makes me happy.

I was thinking about how Batman trains all day and sleeps on;y 3 hours a night, yet he still manages to get a full night’s rest from said 3 hours. Until I stumbled upon this, Very interesting sleep cycle, “Batman Sleep Schedule” seems like a fitting name. Currently trying to see if I can adapt to a sleep cycle.